Periscope Pete, Josh's Walking Coach

Josh: It's The Daily Talk Show, episode 276.

Tommy: You got Periscape Pete in the building.

Peter: Hey team, thanks for having me.

Josh: Peter Shepherd, what's going on?

Peter: Not much, I'm just happy to be here. Yeah, in the neighborhood. Been mentioned on a few episodes recently, so I'm happy to, to come in and have something to say, hopefully.

Josh: Well, you've, you've been my walking partner of late because, um, I wanted Tommy to be my walking partner, but I feel like he's my partner in everything else.

Tommy: Yeah, I don't want to be your walking partner. You need some separation.

Josh: Yeah, at some point.

Tommy: Yeah, exactly. What— because what you've turned into, Pete, is his counselor.

Peter: Yeah, it feels like that sometimes.

Josh: Yeah, who needs a psychologist? That's why I don't need a psychologist.

Tommy: The conversation goes to Josh's friends. Josh says, I'm going walking with my friend Pete, and then Pete says to his mates, I'm going walking with my eccentric mate this morning. It's gonna be—

Josh: it's my client.

Peter: I'm going— I'm going listening with a friend of mine.

Tommy: It's pretty cool because the, like, the conversations that you and Josh have, or we have, we have on this podcast It's like people are converting that into money, which is unbelievable. It's such a new thing. I guess people have been charging for fucking psychology sessions for years, but now we're just like, there's people who just have something amazing within them and they're making money out of that because they're bringing value to someone else. It's essentially what you're doing, but you're not getting paid for the Josh stuff.

Josh: Well, the YouTubers, I've noticed like people putting up, what are they called? Like a schedule where you can book in time for them to talk. But they keep it really low level where it's like, oh, you know, it can be a coaching session, or if you just want to chat, which is sort of like you pay the YouTuber to have a conversation with you. Really? Yeah.

Peter: Wow.

Josh: Which I think is maybe a bit much. It's probably— it feels a little bit like— I get that they need to make income, and people definitely— and the way they frame it is like, it's a great self-development opportunity and it's also a great way to become friends. Don't you think that's a bit weird?

Peter: I think the friends thing is weird. I think if you're adding value as a YouTuber and like, this is my experience and what's helped me get to however many subscribers, yeah, you're adding value. Yeah, but like, if you want to hang out and be my friend and I'm going to charge you for it, yeah, it feels a bit odd.

Tommy: You're basically an escort without the sex.

Josh: I mean, what's it— I mean, coaching, how do you define coaching, Pete? I'm going to move your mic up just a tad.

Peter: There we go. Let's make it even more.

Josh: There we go.

Peter: Perfect.

Josh: Coaching, how do you define it?

Peter: Uh, it's a good question. I, I actually struggle a little bit with the terminology coaching. Because I think it, it can conjure up a lot of images of bad experiences that people have. But for me, I define coaching as like someone— a coach is someone who is curious, someone who asks questions. And what's different to me between a coach and say a mentor is a mentor is usually relying on having an answer or having experience that will help someone. Like in that example, the YouTuber, if it's like, I've developed 100,000 followers, this is how you could do it. For me, a coach is someone who doesn't necessarily have to have had the experience and, and know how to do the thing that this person's doing, but they are curious and they can help someone through that and help them by asking questions and by supporting them and having accountability to help them get to where they need to go without an attachment to what that thing is, what that outcome is, if that makes sense.

Josh: Yeah, I think I could get behind like having a coach. What's the first— like, what should you be looking for when you're trying to find the right coach?

Peter: I think like anything, it's Looks.

Josh: It's good looks. That's how you pick your client.

Tommy: I thought we were talking escorts.

Peter: We're talking coaches, not escorts. Yeah, so good looks first, and then it's basically just, to me, it's like a connection with a human. Do you feel like you want to have a conversation with this person? Do you feel like they are someone who's trying to charge you to be their friend? If so, maybe that's not the best fit. If it's more, I see I could get value from this person because they seem to be interested and curious enough in what I'm doing, then that is someone who I might want to work with. I think it's, it's like anything.

Tommy: Josh has had some pushback on psychologists, and I think about like you as a coach, do you think there needs to be sort of stars aligning with an individual? So it's like right time for them in their career, right time for you in your career, right experience levels on either side where it kind of just hits together? Because I think what, you know, you can find a coach who's like, you're questioning their experience. You don't want any of that stuff on the table.

Peter: Yeah.

Tommy: So you think there needs to be this like synergy or it just won't work?

Peter: Yeah, I think so. I think something I think about is— and while I'm definitely not a psychologist, I imagine the logic is similar in that not everyone needs a coach. In fact, no one really needs a coach, but people need a coach in the right moment with the right opportunity, in the right frame of mind. It's not that it's like a must-have for success, but a lot of people get a lot of value out of having someone at the right point in their life with the right context and the right conversations that they can have, they get a lot of value out of that. So it's not that it's mandatory, so I would definitely not push it on everyone. Yeah, but if someone out there thinks that they need a coach and they have an idea of what success looks like for that relationship and they can define that to a coach, then a good coach I think would say, okay, I can help you get there, or I can't, but I know a guy called Josh and he could probably help you get there.

Josh: Is your being in the world of coaching Do you hang out with a lot of coaches? Is that like— is that— have you noticed that all of a sudden once you started this profession, it's like, oh, hang on, like all these other people are doing it as well?

Peter: Yeah, I think so. I have a group of friends, I guess, and coaches that I hang out with through the Alt MBA that we work with sort of 4 months of the year. So every quarter we run that and we all hang out essentially online and talk a lot. But I think the other thing that I've noticed is I'm not necessarily hanging out with people who I would define as coaches, but But what I notice is that this posture of coaching exists in almost any role. I would say a lot of the work that you guys do is part of coaching.

Josh: We coaches.

Peter: You're asking questions of your clients, you're trying to get them to define success so that you can help them solve a problem.

Josh: Yeah, that's very true.

Peter: That's a coaching posture, it's a curious posture. So I think it's less about, I surround myself with people who call themselves coaches, but more about I'm noticing people like you two and other friends of mine they might be in corporate roles who help clients solve problems, but they're starting to do it with more of a coaching philosophy.

Tommy: Think of this in '97, can you set up that thing for me for the YouTube thing? If people can take either a friend chat or a coaching chat, we'll sort that out.

Peter: Is this costing me? Yeah, definitely.

Josh: Actually, I think there's a book that Michael Bungay Steiner—

Tommy: What a name. Yeah.

Peter: Michael? Did you make that up?

Tommy: No, Michael Bungay Steiner.

Josh: Yeah, no, um, I think it's called The Coaching Habit, which is all about this sort of stuff. Yeah, um, yeah, The Coaching Habit.

Peter: I think he's— is he an Australian guy?

Josh: He's an Australian dude who has a business in Toronto, but he's done like, I think maybe TED or something similar, like Google Talks and stuff. But I filmed him like last year, he was doing something with Dr. Jason Fox. Remember TJ? I feel that he's like— has like the best shirts, this guy. It's got like— super— it reminds me of like You know like the librarians always have like sick Australiana style, like if I can look at it, you're like, oh shit, there's a koala and there's a bit of gum tree. He had that sort of vibe.

Tommy: Is that still an occupation?

Josh: Librarian?

Peter: That's a good question.

Tommy: Like who are they?

Josh: I reckon it'd be the sickest job. I would love to be a librarian.

Tommy: I could name 10 other jobs that would be epic. Not saying librarians bad if you're a librarian.

Josh: It'd be sick, no, but just think like you've got all of this knowledge.

Tommy: And a whole lot of quietness and downtime.

Josh: Yeah, no, but there's— I don't reckon there would be downtime because imagine every single day you'd come in with a different obsession. Like, I would be— say that whole knots thing, like, I was, I was wanting to buy a book on knots and I looked at the reviews and they're like, this is not for beginners. I'm like, not for beginners?

Peter: Yeah.

Josh: Okay, wait for the end. Was the book—

Peter: are you talking about knots with a K?

Tommy: Yes.

Josh: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Peter: So you're into knots?

Josh: Yeah. Well, so there was this book, it's like called the Amanda something. Oh, uh, knots book. But anyway, no, because I went down this rabbit hole of someone said, um, I just typed in knots onto Amazon and I started reading the reviews and then someone had said in an acronym, this is definitely not at the standard of the AMD knots book. And I was like, what the fuck is it? I need the AMD knots book.

Tommy: Yeah, you've come across a subculture. Yeah.

Josh: And so, but if I was a librarian, I'd 100% be in the corner just with a book and a piece of rope just fucking trying different, trying different knots until someone needed to know the whole fucking Dewey system or where they—

Peter: I think it's— I haven't been to a library recently, but a friend of mine went in, I think it might have been in Christchurch. They opened a new library after the earthquakes a number of years ago, and apparently it was like amazing. Yeah, yeah, all technology driven now. There's no old— like, I have in my head this old school system where you go and like type a little book code into a computer and then you go and find it. You have to like scan the—

Josh: which it sounds fun also. I actually, maybe my love of it comes from when I was in primary school I would, if my teachers weren't on yard duty so I couldn't hang out with them, I would do the book stuff. So like, I would— I've always been a bit of a faux reader where it's like I collect, but I love books. Collected all the Goosebumps books that were my brother's, never read them, um, but also big in the librarian thing. And back in the day, big into the librarian thing, that's not what I meant. But, um, do you remember the old barcode readers where it was like a stick and you had to like Do that? Yeah, that's like old school, old school. And you'd be able to look at, um, on the back when the last time it was booked out based on the stamps.

Tommy: I did like that, looking up a book title, seeing it's like at the movie store too. It all used to be sort of hands-on. You'd have to be searching through. One was even like a paper, a folder, you'd open it up, find where it lives. I always just used to love walking up to the counter and saying, have you got this in? Yeah, and then they just type it in.

Peter: Uh, yeah, yeah, we do. It's here. Or no, come back next week. Yeah, and then you walk around the store aimlessly like, yeah, what could I watch?

Josh: How many—

Peter: like the movie store.

Josh: How many books are you allowed to take out at a library at once? Do we know? I mean, with 3 blokes who haven't been to a library, yeah, but I was just wondering, like, is it, um— and why, why do I buy?

Peter: Yeah, it's a fair point.

Josh: Like, why, why are we—

Peter: have a problem if a library has all the books that you want? Yeah. Why is it that we—

Josh: I don't quite understand.

Peter: There's like $20 on—

Tommy: dude, there's free libraries now. You can rock up.

Josh: All libraries are free.

Tommy: Yeah, but ones that you don't have to give a card to. You put your book there and take a book.

Peter: Oh nice.

Tommy: But they probably don't have your books that you're looking for.

Josh: Yeah, yeah, that's more like— that's like one of those community things. But I think the idea is that you, you put— once you've finished it, I guess you put—

Tommy: yeah, exactly, put one, take one.

Josh: Maybe that's what I can do with all my, um Have I given you a copy of some of the books that I have?

Peter: No.

Josh: Pete, can I just go and grab the box?

Tommy: Yeah, go, go, Pete and I will just have a, we'll have a conversation, catch up. Pete, I was looking at your website, uh, sounds like a staged piece of banter. Um, what's a noodle?

Peter: A noodle?

Tommy: Yeah, on your site it's like noodles. I was like, can you order black bean here? What do you got? What's on?

Peter: I think of noodles as like thoughts. Okay, for me I've used the phrase, I don't even know where it came from, of like, I'm noodling on something, I'm thinking about something, okay, trying to unpack something.

Tommy: Okay. And you landed on noodle?

Peter: I've landed on noodle, and I've doubled, tripled, and quadrupled down on it because of conversations like this. People are always like, what is that?

Tommy: I mean, it's similar to like gronk. Yes, I've seen that being used fairly frequent, and it's now entered a lot more.

Peter: It's taking off.

Tommy: Uh, yeah. All right, we're just getting a whole bunch of books getting dumped.

Josh: So I had the idea a while ago starting it a bookshop with my favourite books. So I have all of these books that are all the— do you like Austin Kleon?

Peter: I do actually, I really like Still Like an Artist, it's a great book.

Josh: We've got heaps of them.

Tommy: So yeah, you've almost blocked out Pete's face with this stack of books.

Peter: You can still see him. Great book also.

Josh: Anyway, so I, yeah, I had this idea and we've spoken about it on the Craig Harper episode.

Peter: I think we spoke about it on one of our many walks too.

Josh: Yeah, so I—

Peter: as you were coaching him through the hoarding habits, he said, this is what happened, I ordered 1,000 books and I don't know what to do with them, what should I do?

Josh: So I should, but, um, please take, uh, one of each and all that sort of thing. Yeah, Conspiracy Jimmy's just looking in the corner over there. Yeah, it's actually probably— it looks nice on the desk.

Peter: Yeah, there is— use this decoration.

Josh: There is something that's, um, thanks, calming about books. So On Writing by Stephen King, but Something interesting, I actually, I've listened to the— this is the dumb bit about it, if there wasn't already a dumb bit. The dumb bit is that I've only listened to the audiobook, haven't read this actual—

Tommy: like, majority of the books over there. Yeah, there's a problem. There needs to be a cap. I mean, we've spoken about this many times. My solution was, you know, a T on the whiteboard. One side is bought, one side is read. And so you've got to just if there's more in the bought section between the— rather than the red, as in you've read them, yes, you can't buy any more.

Peter: And so you're not allowed to buy them?

Tommy: Yeah, it should be one in one out because you're always going to— it should be one in one out. Why would you need to? Yeah, there's actually no point. Your co-host, I was listening to your latest episode, the, uh, the, the tall and the short of it— the, the long and the short of it. I was just thinking of your height. That's when I look at that, I'm just like, you've totally done that based on your height, right?

Josh: Yeah, deliberately. So Jen is how tall?

Peter: She's 5'1" and you're 6'7" and I'm 6'7". Yeah, so there's that, but there's also the long and the short of it is like a phrase for when you like explore an idea. Yeah, you look at all sides of it, the long of it and the short of it.

Tommy: Well, she's a hoarder as she pointed out. Yeah, well, she buys books too. Yeah, and has bookshelves in her apartment and she lives in New York. I could imagine her house is— her apartment's quite small for New York because they're all very small. Her walls are just books, but she keeps them and takes them out years later and reads them.

Josh: Yeah, well, this is the thing is that there's no going back with mine because I'm underlining every book that I read. So once I've— it's sort of like putting a mark on it, which is like, you know what, like, I'm taking ownership of this book now. This, this no longer is the author's book, this is something else. This is, this is a hybrid. But the one of the hard things is if I decide to one day go down the whole KonMari thing, no one's going to probably want my books, right?

Peter: Have you written in all of these?

Josh: Oh no, no, no, no, I haven't signed them. That would be— there's a— I know that there are people who will give out books, but they sign— which— but they sign them, but they're not their books.

Tommy: I got given a book for my birthday, one of Seth Godin's actually, and my mate wrote in it.

Peter: Yeah.

Tommy: And then I was like, oh, maybe I take this to Seth Godin and get him to sign it, sign it when we're in New York. Yeah. And I was like but someone else's signed it.

Josh: He'll be like, what the hell?

Peter: My mum used to do that and write a nice message inside the COVID It's lovely.

Josh: I actually have a book that I was given in 2004 called Screenwriting, or maybe it's called Screenplay, by my teacher, and I still have it. It's like, I love that because it's like, it's one of the few things I have as like proof that I actually cared about that shit.

Tommy: Pete, what it's— obviously this excites Josh, and you can see, like, if you watch this podcast, listen to this podcast, you see the sort of ebb and flow of Josh's excitement levels in life. I mean, we probably won't be talking about books this hard in 100 episodes' time, or maybe, I don't know. We've seen it come in and out of what he's talked about. What excites you like this does for Josh?

Peter: In terms of books?

Tommy: Just life. What, like, are you—

Josh: no, I want to double down on the books.

Peter: No, no, no, I'm trying to move away from books.

Josh: It was actually, it was very impressive. Yeah, I enjoyed it.

Tommy: Is there anything that gets you going like this?

Peter: Yeah, I think honestly, like, conversations like this and meeting people like you two and others all like all around the world, I think what's really cool at the moment, and a lot of people talk about this, is like outside of all the bad that people look at with the internet, is it also opens all of the doors to all of the people. And you can surround yourself with the smartest people in the room by putting in a podcast or watching a YouTube video. All their content is free.

Josh: Or you can go on Reddit. Wallow in the shit.

Peter: How did that fad go?

Tommy: Yeah, no, we still post.

Josh: No, we still post the episode. Mr. 97 said, oh man, you know, people are actually upvoting. I didn't have the heart to tell him that that was me. There's already one upvote every time, which I think is him posting it, and then the second upvote is me.

Peter: Wasn't there a time also where you reviewed the podcast on the podcast? Yeah, demonstrate. And it's the one that I looked yesterday, it's the one that sits—

Josh: it's so upsetting.

Peter: Great banter, guys.

Josh: Can we fix that? If you, if you're enjoying the show, please give us a review on iTunes. We never ask.

Tommy: Pete, do you have— because I think like that answer, I, I get it. I enjoy the conversations too, and I've got lots of friends that I think are similar to you where it's like that is what fuels them. But what about like legit hobbies? Like, we're getting old. No, seriously, because I think about this. My life is pretty much making this podcast, doing your business with Josh, having a wife and a baby, no time for yo-yos, and doing the gym. So it's like there's a lot of time spent on just fucking keeping alive and keeping sane that I should probably factor in some fun shit. Yeah, are you doing fun shit?

Peter: Yeah, I think so. I think like I would reframe that for you in terms of I think the work is the fun part. Yeah, not to say that I have a life without any other fun parts, but I know I definitely think I've created that, but then I also go, what about a break?

Tommy: Yeah, like what's my break? What's your break?

Josh: Is that every time the delivery man comes with another book?

Peter: Yeah, what's the 'You guys hiring?' So I think like for me, exercise, going to the gym, that's something that's a break. I have a community of mates that we all sort of work out together most days.

Josh: What came first, the mate— like, were you mates with them and then joined that gym, or did you actually turn gym people into mates? Which I've never heard of.

Peter: Gym people into mates, actually.

Josh: Fuck off, dude, I've done that. Yeah, yeah, it's pretty amazing. Bree, like, we went to Bunnings the other day and she said hi to someone. I said, 'Who's that?' She said that's someone from F45.

Tommy: Yeah, yeah.

Josh: And we nearly stopped. What's the conversation with someone that you— because the Collingwood one's so small, so it's not like they're having real, yeah, deep conversations.

Peter: It's funny, that happens to me too in Richmond. So I train at the one of the CrossFit gyms in Richmond, and you see someone walking down the street in a suit and you're like, how do I know that person?

Josh: They look usually—

Peter: yeah, usually they're in, you know, activewear.

Josh: And so do you hang out with them outside of lifting shit?

Peter: Yeah, like we, we grab a coffee on the weekend, we go out for a beer on a Saturday night. And yeah, I've sort of got a small group of mates through that. And so that, I guess, that would be one of the things I would—

Tommy: you're out there—

Peter: outlet. I think travel as well, like I'd love to, to go on holidays and travel. And, you know, hang out with my girlfriend and we watch Netflix every now and then, or go for a walk, watch a movie. I don't know, I'm trying to like— I feel like I'm living a boring life.

Tommy: No, I know what you mean, but it sounds like some sort of like from the industrial era where people weren't in love with working on the factory floor, the line. And so there was, you know, this pursuit of things outside of work, whereas now a lot of people have converted their sort of work into their life and, and all of that. So it's the escapism, the side hustle, as much.

Peter: So I mean, Seth Godin, who obviously comes up a lot in this podcast—

Tommy: are you dad?

Peter: Someone asked me that.

Tommy: I've met his son Mo. Have you met Mo? Yeah, nice guy.

Peter: Yeah, really nice guy and very smart. Yeah, but yeah, he tells this great story.

Tommy: You'd be shattered if you didn't have a smart son.

Peter: If you're— and as the son, you'd also be pretty flat too. I'm not intelligent, what's going on? Yeah, so he tells a great storey of him being on a laptop in the Bahamas at a hotel or something, and a couple walk past and he heard them snigger like, oh, look at this lowlife, he can't even relax when he's on a holiday.

Josh: Was that too sad?

Peter: Yeah, I think she muttered it to her partner. Okay, yeah, great. And he thought to himself, better to create a life that you don't feel the need to escape.

Josh: Yeah.

Peter: Right, like they live a life where they have to escape work and switch off, where he's like, I enjoy the work I do so I can come to the Bahamas, surround myself with a different environment, but I still enjoy doing my work.

Josh: I love that, 'cause I got, like Bree would go crazy at how much, like especially early on, I've gotten better over the years, but just being on my laptop.

Peter: Yeah, or even like when you were traveling, recording the podcast.

Josh: Yeah, exactly. But that was—

Tommy: You need something. Like I even find filming at family events like Christmas is actually my way of getting through it and enjoying it. Because otherwise when I'm just sitting there and just like, I can be a bit flat, but I'm like, I get up and I'm creative. And so you were, yeah, you were kind of, we're really in this time of meshing together these parts of life to make life more enjoyable.

Peter: Yeah, and I like the idea of doing it in a different environment. So I guess the travel would be one of the things that I would say, just to try it, go to new places.

Josh: And how do you, um, how do you merge, like, with the whole friendship thing? Have you introduced your friends to your girlfriend? And how does that happen in regards to— you start hanging out with people at the gym? Um, Bree and I have done it maybe half a dozen times where it's like you've been able— you've made a friend with one person, and then all as a couple you've ended up like going and hanging out. Yeah. Um, have you, have you actually systematized? Have you got a system process? Has it happened many times?

Peter: Well, it's actually, it's funny because I actually met my girlfriend at the gym.

Josh: Oh wow.

Peter: Yeah, so she was one of the friends that I met and started hanging out with and is now my girlfriend. So we have a similar group of friends.

Josh: Oh, so that's like, so that, so you're all friends, like, so you've got a group of friends?

Peter: Yeah, but having said that, I mean, like anyone, there's there's often I have a friend that she doesn't really know or maybe necessarily want to hang out with and vice versa. I think that's human nature.

Tommy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I've got— I've found that there's some couples I like one of them more so than the other. It's only because I don't vibe with the other. But on the weekend we caught up with Bodhi, my son's first time catching up with one of his mates from daycare.

Josh: How is he one of his mates?

Peter: Do they recognise each other?

Tommy: Oh mate, they're besties. They cuddle, they like always talking about each other. It's just so bizarre. And so the dude who is this kid's dad, he said, he said, "Fuck, mate, I can't even remember him being a baby. Now he's bloody got his mates coming over." But I was like, that statement of like having this transition between, you know, zero and fucking two, and he's already hanging out with his mates. But this couple, we don't know them, but we just really gel with both of them.

Peter: Yeah.

Tommy: And so, and but I've had other couple that we've caught up with where it's like, I just don't— it's just not there. Yeah, which isn't bad, it's just what the reality of it.

Peter: Well, I imagine the reality is it gets even more common in terms of like if Bodhi becomes friends with somebody and you don't necessarily like the parents. Yeah, it's like, and they don't like you.

Tommy: Well, we're not there yet because I still have to say, whereas when he's, you know, 4 or 5, please can I go to Kelvin's? Yeah, Kelvin's dad's up.

Peter: I love you like Kelvin's dad.

Josh: Kelvin's dad's obsessed with money. You just imagine the picture.

Tommy: Kelvin's got more money than us.

Josh: I can actually imagine Kelvin's dad and what he'd be like.

Peter: I've got it pretty clear.

Tommy: He'd drive a Maserati.

Josh: Yeah, he'd have a Maserati and be like, Tommy, how's business, mate? How's the rev? You getting your market share?

Tommy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Always just talking profit and loss.

Josh: One thing on this book, one thing on the book that I only realised when flicking through is this. Which you wouldn't be able to see if you're listening to the audio only, but it's a black dot, a squiggle type of thing.

Tommy: What page is that?

Josh: It's— yeah, so it's page 213.

Tommy: So 213 in the book Stephen King on Writing, there's a black— yeah, it's the— it's—

Peter: oh no, I've got it as well.

Tommy: I've got it too.

Josh: So this is what I'm confused about.

Tommy: It's ridiculous.

Josh: Is this— there's— is this an issue with the printing?

Tommy: Yeah, I think that's 100%.

Peter: I think you could get 43 refunds.

Josh: Yes, yes, you could.

Tommy: I mean, it's 4 years late.

Josh: Stephen, if you're watching, yeah, what's the deal? If this is the case, I want a full refund. I've underlined in all the books already. If you've got the book, have a look. Yeah, if you've got— maybe that's a way of knowing whether you've been gifted a book from me, is based on if you have— if you do have Stephen King's On Writing. Um, if you can work— because Seth Godin had an issue. Did you, did you see that? I saw on his blog talking about it, the printing. He had a printing issue where it's like 100 of the first 100 were all back the front or something.

Tommy: This is marketing. Yeah, yeah.

Josh: Which I would have loved. Like, I would be super happy.

Tommy: Well, that's what he said. He said it's either you want a new one or this is the special edition.

Josh: Yeah, I'd be all for the collector's edition.

Peter: Are we talking about that book in this room?

Tommy: What? Why? Oh, oh yeah, yeah, good one, Pete.

Josh: No, well, it's so— I don't know if you saw the, the Gemma episode. I've decided to— okay, so I've decided to donate the money myself. I just felt bad.

Tommy: Coach him through it, Pete, please.

Peter: Did you? No, yeah, that's fine.

Josh: Yeah, great.

Peter: I'm all for that. Yeah, I don't need to coach him through it. He's got this.

Josh: Yeah, thank you.

Tommy: Did you mention the reverse coach?

Josh: Oh no, so this is probably the one thing that's a problem. Okay, I reckon a good deadline would be 50 days after I move into a new place.

Peter: Okay, okay.

Josh: Is that a copy?

Peter: Yeah.

Josh: So probably I've been more hyped. So I'm over 50 pages.

Peter: Is that, is that all?

Josh: Over 50 pages. Do you know how long?

Tommy: He's definitely not coaching him at this point.

Josh: Do you know how long it takes? So for people who don't know, I've, I decided in December to rewrite Seth Godin's book word for word. Yeah, This Is Marketing. The anxiety— the thing is that, I mean, it's impressive that you've committed to it, but no, it's not. This is the problem. Yeah, you're hyping me up again. I'm like, you know what, it's just impressive fucking committing to it. I don't need to do shit to prove to anyone, to be honest. If it was just you fuckers watching and listening, I'd be fine. It's the problem. The problem is that I emailed Seth. Yeah, and so Seth is going to get— because I said end of December it's going to happen. He's like looking forward to seeing it, which was— I saw as like a little bit slight troll as well, which is like, yeah, I'll believe it when I see it.

Peter: Good luck. Good luck.

Josh: And so it doesn't— as long as I get it done, I feel like we can't have Seth on the podcast.

Tommy: I can't—

Josh: yeah, I can't even send him an email. I had a great idea for something, like I was like, oh, I wonder how Seth feels about this. I was gonna email him, I'm like, I actually can't email anything, I need to go silent until this book's done.

Tommy: It's a big promise. I made the promise last year of making 100 videos, made 25. And it's the public, like it's when it's on a platform, we were talking this morning about people making announcements or announcement videos about them about to do something. I think there's a real problem here 'cause I watched about 2 last night, just random people. One guy's, you know, 'Had a month off, guys. I'm back. Yeah, this year, big changes.' And he was just going into— he basically said nothing. He just said he's gonna travel and make videos, which is what he did last year.

Josh: And so I was like, 'This is an announcement video about nothing.' I reckon if you searched on YouTube, 'I'm back,' or like the amount of, in quotation marks, the amount of fucking vloggers would say, 'Guys, I'm back from my break, I'm feeling good, I've had 6 years off, I've got a few ideas, I'm feeling good about this one.

Tommy: Are you tempted to make announcements about things?

Peter: Not at all.

Tommy: No, you don't? You tend to not do it?

Peter: No, I keep them to myself. I mean, I, I guess announce things to myself in my head, as in make promises and ideas and sometimes set goals, but I'm not one to publicly announce them. I think, I wonder if, I wonder if people have read a book that says making an announcement will help you be accountable to that. I reckon I've decided that that's the way to hold themselves accountable, but clearly it doesn't work. However, your video that you created as a result of it was hilarious.

Tommy: Oh, thanks.

Josh: I thought— well, I think that, that— yeah, you got to see me kicking TJ in there.

Tommy: Actually, did it look like—

Josh: it looked legit.

Peter: Yeah, but then you said it wasn't, so I went back and watched it about 5 times.

Tommy: I mean, we're video guys, we know how to make a video. Yeah, I won't tell, I won't tell.

Josh: No, but we did it a few times, so we first tried doing it slow motion and— oh, actually no, sorry, we started off with my leg being at Tommy's crotch.

Tommy: Yeah, so the reverse and reversing.

Josh: Yeah, but then actually worked out better of me just having the self-control to stop just before he's nuts. That's what you see.

Tommy: Yeah, and I did a little jump. Yeah, I speed ramped it at the very moment that we went out of slow motion and so it made it look like it went really fast. Yeah, technical term, Pete.

Peter: Yeah, no, I'm going to look that up later.

Josh: Yeah, don't bother, just noodle on it for a bit. Yeah, um, I don't know what to say.

Tommy: You were going somewhere good.

Josh: Yeah, what was I— was it something about the, um, uh, being I'm back stuff on YouTube? Yeah, I mean, the rabbit, the rabbit hole stuff of clicking through and creating the storeys on people. I'm constantly doing, which is even without social media. Yeah, even without social media. Well, I'm just finding other platforms. So the daily talk shows, I was up 7% on Sunday. On social media.

Tommy: But no, I, I mean, here's the problem, right, with announcing anything, announcing that you're off social media. People do hold you accountable for stuff. So there is some, there is some sort of like flow-on effect from the announcement, right? Whereas like, if you really didn't want to touch it, which you haven't touched your own, so I'm actually proud of that. Yeah, you haven't done your own social media, you're on the Daily Talk Show.

Josh: Yeah, but I think that it's probably part of it too, to your point, Pete, before about people reading it and then doing it. I reckon it's just natural intuition that makes you think that, oh, I'm going to announce it if I announce it. And I reckon there's a bunch of people, and it's been including myself previously, which is, uh, using the content filter constantly, which is like, how does this look through the fucking theme? What do they call it? What's that, TJ? No, not aesthetic, like the, um, you your Instagram has a certain aesthetic. Yeah, no, not aesthetic, but it's like a layer. People use a certain term which is like a theme, but it's like it has a certain mood and, um, it needs to— but anyway, look and feel.

Tommy: Yeah, yeah, I know what you mean.

Peter: I think that like, I'm sure you guys feel the same way, is like you can announce it, sure, but why don't you just do it? Yeah, you know what I mean? Just show up and do the work. I mean, you don't need to announce anything. People will, will hear about it and find it and see it and go 'Oh, that's interesting, it seems to be that he's doing this every week.' And like, we can figure that out ourselves. You don't need to go, 'I'm going to commit to a weekly video.' Yeah, yeah.

Tommy: I mean, there it is, all a part of story, because I have felt like I need to do that to then do the next thing. And if that is the storey I'm telling myself and it's true, then I may as well just do the first thing. I mean, that I battle with. Like, I thought that video I put out was shit, but it's like the more I do, the more my fucking brain is just like, 'Nah, not good enough, not good enough.' Yeah, isn't that—

Peter: I mean, that's true of anything like creative, basically. I go through that, I feel like, almost every day. Everything I put out there, I'm like, oh, that was shit. Yeah, you know.

Josh: But there's also the other thing I realised is my identity, the things I attach to my identity, there's people who are doing those things at a much bigger scale and they don't talk about it.

Peter: Yeah.

Josh: So like me, like thinking about like, oh yeah, I went to the fucking gym 3 times, or I'm gonna start doing the morning pages, and I speak to you and it's like, oh yeah, like he just quietly mentioned you have to be doing the morning pages. I'm like, oh yeah, fuck it, how long you been doing it for? He's like, oh, consistently for like 4 years. I think it's been about 4 years. I'm like, motherfucker. It's like, here I am trying to like— I like— that's meant to be my fucking identity now.

Tommy: Yeah.

Josh: And Pete's just being low— what do they say? Low, uh, low-key, low-key, low-key doing it.

Tommy: So I'm an assassin.

Peter: Well, I think that's the danger to me of comparison. Yeah, like we, we always compare ourselves to usually— that's what I was going to— we compare ourselves to people who are like on different trajectories or journeys or telling themselves a different story. And sometimes it can cripple us and sometimes it can't. Like the classic one is when we started our podcast, Jen and I listened to— we all listened to it, we both listened to a bunch of Gimlet Media work.

Josh: Have you heard that Spotify might be acquiring them? Mr. 97 was acquiring Gimlet. Yes, I didn't know that. But Mr. 97, just on the mic, that's cool. How much was it?

Peter: That they were— $200 million.

Josh: $200 million.

Peter: Wow.

Tommy: You know who— Chris Sarkis will be happy about that.

Josh: Don't they know they can just download the podcasts for free? There was always the gag. That was the gag that, um, when Facebook acquired WhatsApp, it's like, guys, it's a free download. But how is the— yeah, the storeys we tell.

Peter: But yeah, I was saying with the comparisons to Gimlet is like we could be crippled by that and go, well, the Gimlet podcast is so crisp and so good and so well done, and then listen to our one and go, oh, it's nothing like it, so let's just not bother, or let's tweak it, or let's think about it more. But it's like, it's not a fair comparison because Gimlet Media have a different story. They've got a team of people. This is their thing that they do. And we are just, you know, a couple of freelancers that are doing this on the side of the other work that we do.

Tommy: So it's just a couple of gronks making some podcasts. No, it's true though. This is my new company. Couple of gronks. Um, we've been talking about being the exception because I think we, we look to people in our field that are at the top. Yeah, they're probably just the exception as well. You know, they might not— what's, what's their talent level? I don't know how much greater someone's talent level is than the next bloke who hasn't succeeded. Yeah, yesterday we're talking about celebrity chefs and celebrity psychologists. Are they the best in that? Probably not. They just have a different flavor. What do you think about being the exception?

Peter: I think, I think I would agree. It's like there's, there's probably a bunch of vets out there who are better than the Bondi Vet. I think that was the example you used, but they don't necessarily—

Josh: very defamatory.

Peter: They probably don't feel the need to or want to go down the path of being the vet that's on in the media. And I think that the same is true of a really good musician or a really good writer or a really good podcaster is there's a consistency in the way they show up and they do the work. That you can't deny. But I think there's probably a little bit of luck, there's a little bit of timing, there's a little bit of the right conditions that all of a sudden makes them the person that people look to as the expert. But there's probably people— there will be, I imagine, people that are equally as qualified, skillful, talented, that are in the shadows and still, still trying to show up. And so I think I don't know if that—

Josh: But what is the work, do you think? Because I guess part of it— so for podcasting, I had the idea of just double downing, doubling down. Fucking hell.

Tommy: Can we just—

Peter: sorry, Gemma—

Tommy: can we just write on the wall the words you fuck up that you need to now find the new word for, the right word for?

Josh: What's another way of saying doubling down?

Tommy: Um, focusing, putting all my chips on this one thing.

Josh: That's so fast.

Peter: That was pretty long.

Tommy: It's long.

Josh: It's too long.

Tommy: Now I'm hungry. Chips.

Josh: Anyway, it's also referring to poker, you know, the chips.

Tommy: I know, but chips is many things.

Josh: Um, no, the— what I, what I was thinking is like focusing on the podcast stuff, and then my initial thought was it means I don't need to be on social media, don't need to be here, don't need to be there. But is that part of the job? How do you define when a project— when you're working on a project, which is the, the things that I need to do versus the stuff that you don't need to do.

Peter: Yeah, I'd come back to the question of what's it for? Like, what is, what is this for? And obviously you would have a fair idea of what the podcast is for and what the intent—

Josh: you'd be surprised.

Tommy: Still working it out, Pete.

Peter: But if you have an idea of— I know you guys have an idea of what your podcast is for and what this work is for. And so then to me it's like, well, all of the superfluous stuff like social media, does it serve that mission? If so, awesome, then yeah, maybe that is the work. If it's not, which I think is the general— the general rule is social media doesn't tend to serve us in the work that we do. As a general rule, we get distracted by it, we go on deep rabbit holes that we go down. But if it's serving the purpose of the thing that you want to do, I think it's fine. And I actually think the social media work you've done recently on The Daily Talk Show has been great. So I think it is.

Josh: Well, the one concern I have with it is that we're trying to appeal and connect with freelancers, with people who are doing their own thing, uh, that want to connect in a bigger way. And if our hypothesis is that social media doesn't provide an authentic connection, um, is it the equivalent of me giving— feeding my kids bad food because they like it? Does that make sense? So it's like, am I— we're being on the platform, but if we actually don't think it's good for us personally, I just— I worry that maybe we should be looking at other, other options.

Peter: Yeah, like, what's the trade-off? It's— I think the— it's a fair point because it's, it's almost like saying yes to social media means you're saying no to something else. Yeah. So is this— is there— have you got clarity on what you're saying no to?

Josh: Well, if I, if I, if I wrote a— if I wrote I Quit Sugar. Yeah. And then I opened a lolly shop, um, I don't know, it would feel like— what do you think, TJ? We haven't spoken about this specific idea.

Tommy: Well, I think social media affects your brain differently to me. I think you're taking— and the reason you've— you're off is based on how it affects you.

Josh: It's because everyone I follow are fucking dickheads. That's a joke, by the way.

Tommy: Start from the top, delete them all. But I think it does, because Gemma, it didn't really faze last week. We're talking about this, didn't really faze her. I think some— the people who are probably— some people are probably doing well based on the fact that it doesn't faze them.

Josh: Yeah.

Tommy: And they're just next thing, next thing, next thing. Yeah. So then if that is a skill that you could develop, I don't know. I don't know if you can. I don't know, you might be able to.

Peter: Yeah, yeah. It's almost knowing yourself and your interaction with it, because I think you're right, if it if it serves you— like, clearly Gemma, I thought that was amazing that she was like, I'm not really fazed by the, yeah, the other people and the feedback. And whereas most people, I think, like I said, the generalisation is it's not that healthy for us because we have an obsession with it. But if you, if you don't necessarily have that, then I think it's a good—

Josh: or could you have, like, I think even maybe to Gemma's point, maybe obsession is okay, maybe spending all the time on it is okay too, right? What's been your relationship with social media?

Peter: I, I had a thought to, to retire when I heard you announce— speaking of announcements— when you announced your retirement on the podcast, I thought maybe that's something I should do. And so I've gradually, I think, stepped away a little bit. Well, maybe stepped away is the wrong term. What I'm now looking at with social media is basically trying to use it a little bit like Seth uses it, in that it's a place for me to share the work that I'm doing.

Josh: Your latest post on Instagram, is that a per— The— where we follow you, is that your personal Instagram or is that your work one?

Peter: I think it's my—

Josh: because you got your, you got your rig out. Good rig, solid rig. But I've never seen Seth post a rig photo.

Peter: This is true, this is true. So I was going to say, where I was going with that was Instagram is the one platform at the moment that I'm still using for that sort of thing. Yeah, Twitter I almost deleted, and then I thought, a bit like you've been doing, is like, what if I just posted the podcast and the blog there? Yeah, see what happens. Yeah. Nothing really happens, so I might delete it. Yeah, LinkedIn's a little bit the same. Facebook, honestly, the main reason I'm keeping it at the moment is Instagram and Facebook is we get people that listen to our podcast reaching out saying, I like this episode, and they share it. And I, I think that's really cool. So if I didn't have that, I would think about deleting it because it doesn't add a heap of value to my life.

Josh: But you're also in, in the thick of remote work and doing that, it feels like network tools are more important.

Peter: Yeah.

Josh: So if, if all the relationships that you're having are people in New York or all over the world, there is an expectation where it's like the only way that you're going to connect with those people is through these networks.

Peter: Yeah. Yeah, I think you're right. I think the— I like that frame that I can now tell myself every time I jump on Instagram is like, oh, it's just part of me doing my work.

Josh: Uh, how— so you've got Slack for—

Tommy: is—

Josh: so Alt MBA has started again. How many people are doing Alt MBA?

Peter: So today it started, we've got 3 sessions. Each session has about 115.

Josh: Wow.

Peter: And so I'm head coaching one of the sessions with 115 students, of which— so they're split into cohorts of 20, so basically 5 cohorts of 22. And 2 of those cohorts are in the Australian time zone now, which is really cool. So we've got 44, I think, Australian—

Josh: oh wow—

Peter: or people in the Australian time zone. So Asia Pacific, New Zealand, And yeah, Australia, it's amazing.

Josh: And so, uh, is Slack the main tool that you guys use?

Peter: Yeah, so Slack and Zoom is the sort of— it's like Skype but it works, is how I sort of think of it.

Josh: Yeah.

Peter: And then we have an open source essentially blogging/forum platform as well.

Josh: And how often are people sliding into your DMs in Slack?

Peter: Quite often. The Slack is— the overwhelming Slack is real at the moment for me. So, but it's where I do pretty much all of my communication. I don't really do much emailing in terms of my business. Most of my business is through client conversations with Slack, and with Alt MBA, it's very central to Slack.

Josh: Because TJ, you've never had a job where you've really used Slack in a big way?

Tommy: No, never, never. It's, it's either just succinct emails, which you see the effect from people coming from Slack into businesses that don't use Slack to then how they email.

Josh: Interesting.

Peter: Horrible, really.

Tommy: So they're like informal or just so many.

Josh: They're treating like instant messages.

Peter: They send you a bunch of emails.

Tommy: Yeah, which I think is, it's like a bit disrespectful in some ways because it's like I'm having to sort of sift through emails to find information. So I think, yeah, I think emailing people need to just fucking chill out. Yeah, if you're sending lots of emails, chill out, right? Yeah, put like, maybe don't send it and compile it into one and then just cull. Yeah, because then if, if it's a communication tool, how can you be the most specific or straightforward in the communication style?

Peter: It's true though. I mean, having used Slack a lot, a lot of people use it as like stream of consciousness, like they don't even think. Yeah, that's bad. So if you do that on email, that's, that's horrendous.

Tommy: I think what does that do for people? I think, see, that kind of stuff for me builds anxiety, maybe the same way social media might, just like going through.

Josh: It's just annoying.

Tommy: Yeah, yeah, having to sift through.

Peter: I think in the right context it's actually quite helpful. So I think of, because of a lot of the people that I coach, for example, are like a remote, they're based in America, is I like, I encourage one of the channels I call whiteboard usually, and I'm like, this is the virtual whiteboard. So literally stream of consciousness, go for it, just whatever, and I'll read it when I get time. And when I get access to Slack, I'll look at it. But I actually encourage in the right context thinking out loud on Slack, and I think a lot of people find it helpful to just, just write and get it out there.

Josh: How do you—

Peter: if it's filling out your inbox.

Josh: Yeah, yeah, yeah. How do you focus on tone when you're slacking people? Do you ever find that when you're, um, asking a question or giving thoughts, it could be misread?

Peter: Yeah, I think it, it— for me, it highlights the need to, to pause a little bit. So I, I try not to coach stream of consciousness, but I encourage creatives and people to think stream of consciousness. But if I'm going to ask them a question, I, I guess I sort of say it out loud to myself in my head would be probably one tactic that I would use. But yeah, there are times where it could be seen out of context. So I think coupling it with Zoom, yeah, and having an actual conversation with a person is really important. So it's not your only form of communication.

Josh: Big emoji user? Do you use emojis?

Peter: Actually, I do dabble in an emoji. I don't mind them. GIFs, I think, are quite fun too. Yeah, I'm quite an audio— what do you call that? Audiovisual? Visual communicator.

Josh: Yeah, we don't really use it. No, I think it's great. We've actually just started, um, we've got a Giphy account now, and we're having an account. We've got an account. Yeah, the Daily Talk Show Giphy account.

Peter: Can I expect a GIF from you?

Josh: Yeah, absolutely. We could do something if we could think of something funny visually. To do.

Tommy: There was a good point where Pete looked over at me and did like a—

Josh: Oh really? What was I saying?

Tommy: Based on something you said, I don't know, we'll find it, but it was funny.

Peter: I did give you a little look.

Tommy: We had a little moment.

Peter: Forgetting the fact that it's actually all going to be on video.

Josh: Yeah, well, I analyse them after each episode, so there'll be body language. Do you guys listen back? Nah, can't fucking do it.

Peter: It's a lot every day.

Tommy: Yeah, I've got worse as well. I I think with them being now filmed is like, I can't sort of listen. I don't want to hear like, I don't know, we're just, I think that's why the pace at which we're doing them, I think if we did one a week we'd be like, okay, where can we improve?

Peter: Yeah, yeah, because ours is one a week and I often listen back and think, I could improve on this. I use it as a way to enhance skills of communication and listening, but every day would be a lot.

Josh: I don't actually know how to, um, how to manage that because part of it is if you listen, you can improve, right? But if you listen, you can also overthink. So maybe I think that what ends up happening is, say, Mr. 97 will be finding snippets, and just through that snippet finding, yeah, whatever it lands on, I'll like slowly be like, oh, that was fucking weird, or I interrupted them there, and then so I'll slowly build up a database rather than the analysis. Like, I feel like that's maybe a more natural way of listening to it, which is just dropping on a point and listening. Yeah. Versus maybe hearing it from start to finish.

Tommy: There's a lot more penny drop moments in the first 100 episodes, 150 episodes, than there is at the moment.

Josh: Yeah.

Peter: Isn't that absurd just to, just to say that out loud though? Like 150 episodes? Well, 270.

Tommy: Yeah, the, the amount actually is the growth, right? So the consistency of the 5 days is the difference. Like, we would be I listen to these two other dudes who have a podcast. Sometimes it sounds like they're just so emo and just so like reflective and just— but the reality is they do one every week or one every two weeks and we get like that, but then we followed up with nothing like that.

Peter: There's four other ones.

Josh: But that's the weird thing is that that's the promise they've set. So I sort of like it. I like being able to hear like, okay, this is— we know that we're going to get this honest format style. Yeah, well, I think that the tricky thing with us is whenever I think about an episode back and then I think it, then someone will email us or reach out on social media or whatever it is, I'm like, what are those people thinking about this episode? Like these different episodes, I'm like, this completely— like our international audience has no idea about interscores.

Peter: Yeah.

Josh: Or like, uh, local sort of foods and shit like that.

Peter: But I think that Mr. 97 is like a 97-year-old man.

Tommy: An old guy in the corner, tech guru at 97.

Josh: But so I think that that is interesting. What I did hear from, um, Scott Adams, who wrote Dilbert, or like did the illustration— quirky, quirky fucker. I started— he does a daily video thing on YouTube, just talks to the camera.

Peter: Yeah, I read his book recently that explained why Donald Trump won the election.

Josh: Oh really? It's all—

Peter: he's a trained persuader. Yeah, it's really, really interesting.

Josh: Yeah. And so, yeah, Scott Adams, Adam, super quirky dude, loves having theories on everything. He's done a Joe Rogan, uh, episode. And, um, yeah, but he, he was just— he's always— it's very political at the moment, so I don't watch it as much. I just can't be fucked. But he, um, he was talking to Joe about being, um, inconsistent in, in your product will actually be, um, better for you. So an example would be if you've got like a really great restaurant, yeah, and then 1 in 10 isn't that good, like meals, yeah, 1 in 10 meals isn't that good, you actually end up becoming more addicted to that experience. So like I think about my favourite Mexican restaurant and, uh, Mum and Dad at Mexican Cantina, probably 1 out of 10 times I'd be like, oh geez, the beef was too salty. I was always like, this fucking great, or whatever. But I reckon, but they kept going back And so it plays into it. So Scott Adams' point is that the, the shit bits actually make a way more addictive than being good all the time. So he was sort of saying that Trump's, uh, sort of thing being all over the place and unpredictable nature is actually more addictive than, say, Hillary Clinton, who was, was consistent, polished all the time.

Peter: That's interesting. I wonder if it's got something to do with the fact that, like, as humans we can relate more to or we respond more to when we see that someone has a flaw.

Josh: Yeah.

Peter: And he's a human being and you're like, oh, I can connect with that because I'm flawed too.

Josh: Yeah.

Peter: And it's actually like, it's one of the things I love about your podcast. It's flawed. This is not planned. No, but it's like you two, you live and breathe and embrace.

Josh: Look down the barrel of the camera.

Peter: Who you are. This is a testimony.

Josh: Yeah, this is a testimony.

Peter: No, you actually, I think you both do this really well. You embrace who you are, quirks and all, whereas a lot of other content producers present a certain image of themselves. And this is why I think a lot of people don't like Instagram or Instagram celebrities or models, is because we project a certain image of ourselves. Whereas you guys are like, yeah, we've got a bunch of really good thoughts and are really articulate in certain areas, but there's also a bunch of stuff where we're just talking about, you know, squeegees and random stuff like that. Yeah, like, I think that— I think, like, I relate to that.

Tommy: Yeah, like You relate to the squeegee?

Peter: Not the squeegee. But I relate to like the flaws that we have.

Josh: Yeah, well, I think that it's probably part of the creating a medium or a system that allows for authenticity, which for us is daily. I can't fucking hide my flaws every day. If it was once a week, I could bring a certain sort of element to it, right? I could be all like, fucking just, it's a daily talk show everyone, and be pumping up music and all all that sort of shit. Yeah, but, um, what have I just done? 1, 2, 1, 2. I managed to, um— why can't I hear myself?

Peter: Hello?

Josh: 1, 2.

Tommy: Hello?

Josh: So this is where I fuck it. Hang on, standby. Hang on, we're still definitely recording. It's a nightmare. We can definitely— I can still see.

Peter: I mean, I can hear you if that helps.

Tommy: Yeah, yeah, we're in the room.

Josh: Oh, maybe— oh, that's what I did. I pressed the solo button on that track. That was a nightmare. So literally, it's like a radio. This is why I shouldn't fucking touch buttons. I tried to be zany. I was like, you know what, this is an opportunity. I'm gonna fucking just do it.

Peter: I mean, you've got it there, you may as well try.

Josh: But what I pressed was the solo button. So it's used— TJ, did you have that in radio? Like this, where you can basically listen to a track through your headphones, but it's not going out.

Tommy: That made you sound even more crazy.

Josh: Actually, 'cause they wouldn't have even heard it. What I did was I like played played some fucking music. Anyway, yeah, just like that.

Tommy: I hope it's not coming through again.

Josh: Everyone's hearing that now.

Tommy: They'll just hear him just flailing.

Josh: But the whole thing was that I would love to do the like, oh, it's the Daily Talk Show everyone, and oh, happy Saturday. But that isn't authentic. I think it's fine. But I do it nearly every morning, and 97 and TJ just fucking eye rolling as I'm like testing out the testing out the audio.

Peter: It fits the quirkiness of the rest of you.

Josh: Yeah, exactly.

Peter: Like, we all know it's funny.

Josh: Do you, um, have you changed your tone or how you do the show? What's been the learnings with The Long and the Short of It?

Peter: I think probably the biggest learning is the value that you get from having those conversations and articulating thoughts that are unplanned and unscripted. Like, it's the sort of thing that I think is valuable even if no one was listening. Is like having space and time to have a conversation with someone where you don't know what they're going to say. So you have to practise active listening, you have to listen, and then you have to challenge yourself to come up with a question or an assertion or an idea to present back. So the learning for me is how transferable podcasting is into every other aspect of certainly my work, is all a lot of my work is about listening, is about asking questions, is about thinking creatively. And that's literally what we do for 30 to 20 or 20 to 30 minutes once a week. So I like that it's very transferable.

Tommy: I find it a bit more powerful than writing. In combination with writing, it's really powerful. But just the— when I write, I'm thinking and then thinking about what I've written, but it's all still just this dialogue in my head.

Josh: Yeah.

Tommy: Whereas when I've said it, yeah, it's like, ah, yeah.

Peter: I, I told a storey recently to a friend who— and I was saying, oh, we don't really prepare, like we don't do— we don't have notes, we don't know what we're going to say. I'm very much off the cuff. And he's like, yeah, but also you've both already done the work. Like, you're actually— it's almost improvisation based on the things that you already know and think. And I was like, that's quite a cool way of thinking about it. It's like improv.

Josh: Yeah. No, I think the, the thing that I struggle with is working out how much within a conversation delivering something— like, the reason that I deliver something, I feel like, is to then create conversation, to get these other people to think and to have thoughts.

Peter: Not that you want to cover off this, this, yes, but you're like, this could be a cool conversation.

Josh: Yeah, but what I worry about is that then I guess the difference is like when people think about an interview, it's very much like, oh, here's a question and deliver it. Whereas some— most of my questions come in like a random thought, which I think listening back can sometimes sound like super fucking self-absorbed.

Peter: Yeah, but no, but I like it because I think the opposite of, you know, those podcasts or interviews you listen to and the person has a list of questions and they won't deviate from that list of questions, even when the person they're interviewing just had this great storey they're about to tell and they like go this jarring transition over here.

Josh: Yeah.

Tommy: And what's more amazing is some of those podcasts are in the browse function.

Josh: Yeah.

Peter: Oh yeah, the podcast top like 5.

Josh: I know, but I think that, that, but I think that that's, it's appealing to some people. And so like it has, it serves a purpose. I think if we think about like doing, having a conversation and all that sort of stuff, I think it's slightly Yeah, slightly different.

Peter: It's a different form of podcast, right?

Josh: Yeah, but part of it too is I feel like maybe sometimes I need to elevate myself, like energy. Do you find that like in social situations, do you like— I almost like don a, not a persona or whatever, but I feel like I'm like, hey, I have to go like a little bit like wacky. And sometimes like, I feel like TJ, you pick up on it sometimes, like why the fuck are you being like that? Yeah.

Tommy: You're just surviving, bro. You're crying in the toilets.

Peter: Are you a bit more consistent, do you think?

Tommy: Yeah, I definitely think so. But I definitely feel that there is something there, not an act, but it's just like an energy that you meet the other energy with. Yeah, that's required at parties and stuff. So I can, like, I get in moments where I'm like, I don't want to talk. I don't want to have to be that guy of just, I just want to be by myself or be with my family, you know. It's like, so I do feel that, and I think I've got more like that as I've got older.

Peter: I was thinking the same thing, is as I get older, I find I have more of those moments where like, oh, I could happily just stay at home tonight.

Tommy: And booze helps, and you haven't been a boozer, Josh. So it's like you literally— it just, it gives you that.

Josh: Are you much of a drinker, Pete?

Peter: I would say I'd maybe similar to Tommy in that—

Josh: an alcoholic?

Peter: No, no, definitely not. I'm probably somewhere in between both of you, and I'm finding less and less that I drink. And yeah, more and more I would rather sit at home and read a book or watch a documentary or something.

Josh: Book-wise, what are you reading at the moment?

Peter: At the moment?

Tommy: Yeah, Stephen King and—

Peter: I'm writing 250 Stephen King. Yeah, no, I'm reading a book by Dan Pink, which Seth actually recommended, and it's called— I've completely forgotten.

Josh: It's called— He wrote Drive.

Peter: He wrote Drive.

Tommy: Was it called as in the movie Drive?

Josh: No, it was a— there's a book called Drive.

Peter: Yeah, it's something like Something to do with everybody is a salesperson, or To Sell Is Human. That's what it's called.

Josh: Okay.

Peter: Yeah. And it's— the premise is very much, as you can imagine, is like, people— the salesmen have a bad rep, the idea of being a salesperson. And he has a bunch of research that basically proves that we're all salespeople. It is one of those books though, that once you get— you get the joke.

Josh: Yeah.

Peter: I feel like I don't need to finish the book because I'm like, I get it, we're all salespeople.

Josh: What's the biggest technique though that you can take out of it from the book? Yeah.

Peter: I think, I mean, it emphasises things that I'd already thought, which is to be a genuine, curious, empathetic human. That's the best sales technique, is don't have an agenda, don't force sales on people, just be curious and ask questions and empathise with other people. And if they think you can help them solve a problem, they will buy from you. If they don't think you can help them solve a problem, they will not buy from you.

Tommy: If you're into network marketing, not the book for you.

Peter: Yeah. If you're into growth hacking, definitely not for you.

Tommy: Yeah.

Josh: Yeah, whiteboarding.

Tommy: Car salesman?

Peter: No.

Josh: Why are all the 10x guys, they all have whiteboards, don't they? Have you noticed that? That they're always in front of the whiteboard.

Tommy: He's saying he's doing something.

Josh: But it's whiteboarding has got a brand problem because of all these marketers. And now, like, if I see a video on LinkedIn and they've got a whiteboard, I'm like, these fucking guys.

Peter: I haven't seen these videos. Really? I love whiteboarding. So now I'm starting to question whether I'm one of these people.

Tommy: TJ. There's a lot of whiteboarders out there. Is there? It looks The action of it looks like you're doing something. Yeah, it looks like you're getting shit done.

Josh: A lot of funnels, drawing funnels.

Peter: That's why I like it so much.

Tommy: But maybe you are actually doing something and getting stuff done. There's a lot of people that aren't.

Josh: Peter Shepherd, thanks buddy. Thanks for coming on the show.

Tommy: What did you think of the video experience?

Peter: It was fun. It was different. I actually, I had to cheque myself this morning, make sure, you know, I didn't have something in my teeth.

Tommy: And yeah, just fuck, I should have told you you do.

Peter: No, I enjoyed it. I don't know whether I'll watch myself back because I'll get a bit nervous, but I'm just looking forward to my fuck-up because that was—

Josh: whenever I get like a genuine panic, any genuine panic, I get hot. I wasn't actually sweating.

Peter: Did you get a bit of a sweat up?

Josh: No, no sweat.

Peter: The bit I'm looking forward to actually, I am going to watch it back because I want to see when I gave you the eye when Josh said something and I can't remember what he said.

Tommy: And then he walked off. I don't know.

Josh: Yeah, we'll find out. Google Human Periscope if you want to see what Pete's up to.

Tommy: Check out his noodle—

Josh: I mean, his noodles, all of his noodles.

Tommy: At all.

Josh: Because Peter Shepherd, every time I Google it, I either fuck up the spelling for one.

Peter: You get the shoe store.

Josh: Yeah, that's what TJ was saying. Collins Street, it's Melbourne. We can work on searching. We can work on SEO with you.

Peter: Absolutely.

Josh: It's a daily talk show. HiTheDailyTalkShow.com if you want to send us an email. Otherwise, we'll see you tomorrow.

Peter: See you guys. Thanks.